The Austins' Travel Blog: Blog Entry XIV Jeju Island

We left Watson and the kids in Busan to take the 60 minute flight to Jeju, a volcanic island situated about 130 km from the southern tip of the Korean mainland.

Korea's largest island and smallest province, Jeju is about 1/3 the size of P.E.I.

With its coconut trees and volcanic rock, it is sometimes called the Hawaii of Korea.

The early morning arrival gave us time for a good stroll to get our legs back.

Our helpful hotel clerk suggested we head south on Route 1139 to the Jeju Arboretum.

Koreans are nature lovers, especially on Jeju where the shared passion is to amble amongst the trees and flowers and if possible in sight of their two favorite things...
-the sea
-and mighty Mount Halla.

Jeju, the island of luv...

Our next stop was Loveland...and what a powerful eye opener that was!

In contrast to Korea's puritanical public manner, the central theme of this park is...

the power of love, carnal love that is.

The history: Devastated by the Korean War, life for Koreans was principally about survival and overcoming incredible adversity.

War's end did allow one tradition to regain foothold... chastity before the arranged marriage.

But once married, the long-crippled Korean economy allowed for few indulgences.

Korean newly-weds could ill afford to travel abroad so Jeju, the warm island, became the honeymoon destination of choice.

The outcome: In the late 1980s, Jeju's hotel managers realized that many timid newly-weds were struggling.

They began to offer "professional icebreakers", evening entertainment featuring erotic elements that might help the couples relax and even spark some curiosity.

Taking it one step farther, graduate students of Seoul's Hongik University began creating sculptures for a new park.
Loveland opened in 2004.

Curious? Well, you've got to be at least 18 years old to get in.
I was just worried that Linda was going to be carded.

Climb every mountain...

Standing proudly almost 2 km above sea level, the great Halla, a dormant volcano, dominates the island.

Locals hold it in great esteem and told us that Halla is Jeju Island and Jeju Island is Halla.

Linda and I decided to climb the Eorimok Trail, a tame little trail that would lead us to the top of one of Halla's 360 dormant satellite volcanoes.

As Linda would say: Tame? My butt!

A short bus ride and a 15-minute walk, got us to the foot of the mountain where we were told that the tame Eorimok trail was:

a) a 2.5 hour hike up some very steep climbs and

b) covered in deep packed snow for which crampons were highly recommended.

What to do? We returned to a small dark building standing inconspicuously near the park entry where we had seen a sign in the window.

Linda gave a knock on the small sliding side door and to our surprise, a bowing young store keeper smiled and asked us in.

It took a game of charades but she finally did understand.

Disappearing behind a curtain, she returned with two small packages.

What's this? Crampons in a bag!
She shod us both and asked for $4.50 each.
A day well started.

Linda was a trooper. She never gave up and felt very proud to have reached the summit.

And the reward? A lovely day with marvelous views of mother Mount Halla.

Picture this...

On Thursday, Linda and I took a full day tour of the island.

Our first stop was the Trick Art Museum. My initial suspicions that this was a time filler gave way to real delight...a real hoot.

The museum exhibits paintings that create optical illusions.

The whole idea is not only to look but to touch and take photos.

Guess who had way too much fun here?

A “Wok” back into history...

Our next, the Seongeup Folk Village, was a real revelation.

It showed life and Jeju's unique culture right up until the 1970's.

While outside the walls, women were making great huge cords out of pampa grass to secure the thatched roofs during the island's frequent storms,

Inside, we were about to enjoy a traditional Jeju grilled pork meal cooked with vegetables in a wok.

And "Wok" a delicious meal it was!

Sadly, the meal was a communal one. That means that you must compete with the very adept at chop sticks if you don't want to be left undernourished or at least under-fueled for the afternoon activities.

Stone Grandfathers

Jeju's relative isolation allowed it to develop a culture distinct from that of mainland Korea...

with thousands of local legends and cultural artifacts like the ubiquitous "stone grandfather"....

Carved from porous volcanic rock, they can stand to almost 3 meters in height.

Locals believed that powerful shamans descending from the north had founded a magic mushroom cult here.

They created the stone grandfathers to protect their mushrooms from unwanted spirits.....and people.

Obviously the grandfathers did their job well. Everywhere I ate mushrooms on the island, they were delicious.

Good job, grampa, even if you do look like a phallic symbol!

Climb every mountain...the sequel

After lunch, it was the huge lava cone at Sunrise Park that had us tying up our shoe laces for a climb.

From sea to summit, it was a 690 meters.

Again, Linda was at the top of her game.

At the summit, we could see both inside the dormant volcano and.."Hello!",.....

"Are those mermaids down there on the beach?"

The mermaids of Jeju – the Haenyo

The closer we got the more sure they may have been mermaids but no sirens of the sea.

In fact, the youngest of the group was 62, the eldest, 78.

But dive they could! For 15 minutes at depths of as much as 20 meters, all to snatch their daily harvest from the sea.

The founding of a matriarchy

Just as we approached, they began to sing their traditional song before slipping carefully into the cold waters of the East China Sea. But why were the women fishing?

Remote and volcanic Jeju was always poor for agriculture.

It was the sea that accounted for the very survival of the family

But Korea's leaders outlawed the men from diving, preferring to retain them as soldiers.

The women then came to the sea as divers. They had so much success that the gender roles changed entirely.

In fact, any clash with Korea's Confucian culture, in which women are traditionally treated as inferior, was accommodated for.

The Haenyo still dive today but their prospects do seem bleak in this new modern Korean society.

Whatever the future holds in store, our afternoon with them left us hoping that time, as it marches on, would not leave them behind.

Life in a lava tube.

TheManjang Cave, a 17 km.-long lava tube, was our last stop. We tourists only had access to a 2.5 km. segment which ended with a beautiful surprise: a bright blue and green stalactite rising through a... cracked ceiling.

Really! A cracked cave ceiling?

Yikes!!!